The Walt Disney Company in China, the Ministry of Culture’s China Animation Group, and Tencent, China’s largest internet service provider, have formed a partnership, “The National Animation Creative Research and Development Cooperation,” to advance the country’s animation industry. The organization, announced at a signing ceremony in Beijing today (Tuesday), will serve as an incubator to train local talent and develop original content that will entertain audiences in China and worldwide. “The National Animation Creative Research and Development initiative is focused on nurturing local talent and recognizes the importance of developing original local animation content,” said Andy Bird, Chairman of Walt Disney International.

“Disney’s involvement builds on our expertise and long term commitment to nurture the local original animation industry. As founding partner we look forward to working with this new creative partnership in creating content for the Chinese and international marketplace,” he added. Mr. Bird was joined at the ceremony by Liang Gang, Chairman of the Board for China Animation Group, Ren Yuxin, a senior executive of Tencent, and Gao Zheng, deputy director general, Cultural Industry Department for the Ministry of Culture.

As part of the initiative, Disney will provide its expertise in storytelling from concept creation and story development to market research. Disney will work with the China Animation Group and Tencent to foster local content across mediums, including television, motion pictures and digital platforms, for distribution in China and internationally. Tencent, one of China’s largest Internet service portals, will provide online marketing support.

Are we sure that the goal here is cheaper labor for movies produced for the U.S. and not the production of animated films that are tailored to the local Chinese market - i.e., along the lines of Roadside Romeo and The Secret of the Magic Gourd (which was an adaptation of a well known Chinese story)?

While Romeo didn't fare well in India it's my understanding that Gourd did pretty well in China.

The reference to "entertaining audiences in China and worldwide" could simply be that films which are successful in China and might have a broader appeal could be distributed elsewhere.

And the prevailing thought in business these days seems to be that high growth potential will come from foreign markets such as India, China and Brazil.

Why would Disney help China's animation industry if it didn't intend to profit by it and use it? Why make even more competition for yourself? They intend to use them as cheap labor as most business in the West do. Sad.

While we all love our Disney movies in the United States, they're not necessarily universally embraced around the world (though granted, the example offered in this article is a Dreamworks production).

Consider that Disney may be hoping to create Chinese Disney characters in hopes of bolstering attendance at Shanghai Disneyland. It's no secret that attendance at Hong Kong Disneyland has been dismal and IIRC some analysts believe that's because many attendees don't have an affection for Disney characters the way those of us in the U.S., Europe and Japan do.

While we all love our Disney movies in the United States, they're not necessarily universally embraced around the world (though granted, the example offered in this article is a Dreamworks production).

Consider that Disney may be hoping to create Chinese Disney characters in hopes of bolstering attendance at Shanghai Disneyland. It's no secret that attendance at Hong Kong Disneyland has been dismal and IIRC some analysts believe that's because many attendees don't have an affection for Disney characters the way those of us in the U.S., Europe and Japan do.

There are lots of people in China and the middle class in China is rapidly expanding. As people's standard of living increases, so does their expenditure on non-necessities - including entertainment.

As the articles above suggest, Chinese movie goers want to see Chinese movies. Partnering with filmmakers who understand Chinese culture will help Disney meet that want (rather than dubbing a movie into Mandarin and assuming Chinese movie goers will flock to see it). Check out the Disney World Cinema offerings and you'll see that they're definitely exploring that concept with The Secret of the Magic Gourd, Trail of the Panda and even a Chinese version of High School Musical (all of which were made for Chinese audiences).

As for Shanghai Disneyland, I think Disney is simply following the same model it uses in the U.S.: it's films and its theme parks feed off each other. It's movies to some extent drive attendance at theme parks, such as through movie-related attractions, like Toy Story Midway Mania or the opportunity for your children to meet Rapunzel and Flynn Ryder in person. Disney then uses their theme parks to advertise their movies. When I was at WDW last November, the place was rife with advertisements for up and coming films.

I'm a lawyer by training, not an economist, but I'd imagine its for the same reason that most companies are expanding their presence in China: opportunity for revenue growth.

It's all about the mighty $. Unfortunately a few short-sighted greedy snobs have just focused on themselves, their personal wealth and their well-being in the near future, not the overall picture and future generations. It's sad to think how much damage they don't realize they are doing in the long run. Like I said in a previous post, trade is ok, but globalization is a failure.

Before anyone decides to go jumping ship for Dreamswork it says in this article above that Dreamswork as well has parterned with Chinese companies to make movies as well as well as other companies so Disney is not the only one doing it.

I'm a lawyer by training, not an economist, but I'd imagine its for the same reason that most companies are expanding their presence in China: opportunity for revenue growth.

It's all about the mighty $. Unfortunately a few short-sighted greedy snobs have just focused on themselves, their personal wealth and their well-being in the near future, not the overall picture and future generations. It's sad to think how much damage they don't realize they are doing in the long run. Like I said in a previous post, trade is ok, but globalization is a failure.

This. Also added to fact that the US economy owes China in huge ass debt. That's also why this news is BS.

I don't get the big anger here. First of all, the whole collaboration is primary for the domestic Chinese Market only and will most likely not affect the US animation industry. Secondly, it would be dumb from Disney to not be part of this market. The Chinese Market is growing like no other (except the Indian) whether Disney take part in or not.

Globalization may have its disadvantages, but don't forget that the US economy is all in all a big winner. A world without globalization would be also a world without international market. I just have to leave the house and McDonald's, Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts stores are basically everywhere. Amazon Germany is building right now their eighth warehouse in Germany. We are talking about a country which is not even as big as Montana.

It is pretty doubtful Disney would even exist today, if they would only produce for the US market. Remember the dark times during WWII, when they had to make propaganda shorts and package movies to survive?

While globalization may not be great for the U.S. (that's debatable, but I certainly understand that it has had a devastating impact on a number of wonderful, hard-working individuals), I'm not sure it's a bad thing for Disney or animation as an art form.

Why can't the next Glen Keane come from China or India or some other country besides the United States?

And if this really is just an outsourcing exercise to save money, Disney has to do it too, or it's going to be left in the dust and unable to compete with DreamWorks and the like. If DW outsources and Disney doesn't, DW will see their profit margins increase on each film, which it can then invest in new films, new technologies, talent, etc. Disney will have a hard time being revolutionary (i.e., like this new technique used in Paperman) and a hard time retaining talent like Ron & John, Alan Menken, etc. who could be lured away by ridiculously higher payouts at DW which Disney can't afford to pay because it's costs in making movies is so much higher than DW's cost.

And while Disney holds a special place in my heart and I always want them to do what I think is the "right" thing, at the end of the day, it's a business, and a publicly traded company at that. If Disney films aren't profitable, shareholders will doubtless demand leadership change that will make the company profitable, even if profitability comes in the form of crap like High School Musical 16.

While globalization may not be great for the U.S. (that's debatable, but I certainly understand that it has had a devastating impact on a number of wonderful, hard-working individuals), I'm not sure it's a bad thing for Disney or animation as an art form.

Why can't the next Glen Keane come from China or India or some other country besides the United States?

And if this really is just an outsourcing exercise to save money, Disney has to do it too, or it's going to be left in the dust and unable to compete with DreamWorks and the like. If DW outsources and Disney doesn't, DW will see their profit margins increase on each film, which it can then invest in new films, new technologies, talent, etc. Disney will have a hard time being revolutionary (i.e., like this new technique used in Paperman) and a hard time retaining talent like Ron & John, Alan Menken, etc. who could be lured away by ridiculously higher payouts at DW which Disney can't afford to pay because it's costs in making movies is so much higher than DW's cost.

And while Disney holds a special place in my heart and I always want them to do what I think is the "right" thing, at the end of the day, it's a business, and a publicly traded company at that. If Disney films aren't profitable, shareholders will doubtless demand leadership change that will make the company profitable, even if profitability comes in the form of crap like High School Musical 16.

I'm kinda torn myself. I could argue both causes. on one hand, I want the American economy and animation community to recover, to stay here. On the other hand, why should we be against another culture's seeing their own growth in animation?

I guess the bias comes from the fact that china is killing us in so many things, its not hard to root against them.

One of the reasons outsourcing gets a bad rap though is that results are usually worse than what you'd find here. This is usually due to a huge lack of communication from the main studio. But if handled right this could be a great thing for the art form. If they can teach them do do more than just mindless assembly line work and bring the creative people out into the spotlight not only will the results be better, but their culture will have something that they will connect with more.

We are moving toward a global economy, but in the process we're seeing a lot of growing pains, and its hard to see a day where things will level out again enough to where Americans can find jobs in general. Its going to be lopsided for a very long time before we figure this out.

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